ABSTRACT
Immunotherapy has become a common means of cancer treatment. In immunotherapy, PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors have significant efficacy. Cancer and various opportunistic infections are common complications in patients with AIDS. Owing to the special immune situation of these patients, AIDS is regarded as an exclusion standard in most clinical trials for cancer immunotherapy, conferring immunotherapy difficulty in treating patients with AIDS. The popularity of effective antiretroviral drugs has prolonged the lifetime of people with AIDS. Therefore, exploiting the opportunity of using immunotherapy in AIDS with cancer is urgent.
ABSTRACT
Programmed cell death-1/programmed cell death-ligand 1(PD-1/PD-L1) inhibitors have been approved for a variety of tumors, whereas the efficacy as monotherapy is low. How to sensitize the efficacy of PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors through combined radiotherapy is the current research focus. Multiple studies have demonstrated that the combination of radiotherapy and anti-PD-1/PD-L1 therapy has yielded survival benefits. Nevertheless, ionizing radiation is a double-edged sword for anti-PD-1/PD-L1 therapy. For patients with metastatic cancers, radiotherapy should be fully exerted as a sensitizer to systemic anti-PD-1/PD-L1 therapy and the immunosuppressive effects should be avoided as much as possible. It is closely correlated with the selection of radiation dose, fraction size, treatment timing and irradiated numbers and sites. Therefore, this article reviews how to optimize radiotherapy combined with anti-PD-1/PD-L1 treatment scheduled for advanced stage metastatic cancers.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND@#Programmed cell death 1 or programmed cell death ligand 1 inhibitor (PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor) and docetaxel, as the standard second-line treatments of advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients, have limited effects. There are few studies on whether docetaxel combined with PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor can increase the efficacy and make patients better benefit. The aim of this study is to evaluate the efficacy and safety of docetaxel combined with PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor for the second-line treatment of stage IV NSCLC patients.@*METHODS@#Stage IV NSCLC patients (n=118) who received treatment at Shandong Cancer Hospital between October 1, 2018, and December 31, 2020, were retrospectively analyzed. They were divided into observation group (n=69) and control group (n=49) according to different treatment plan. Observation group was given docetaxel plus PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor, while control group was given PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor. The clinical curative effect and the incidence of adverse reactions of grade 3 and above were compared between the two groups.@*RESULTS@#The disease control rate (DCR) was higher in the observation group (89.9%) than that in the control group (73.5%) (P=0.019), and the objective response rate (ORR) showed no significant difference between observation group (24.6%) and control group (16.3%) (P=0.276). Till June 22, 2021, the 1-year PFS rate showed no difference between observation group (16.5%) and control group (7.7%) (P=0.205). During the treatment period, the adverse reactions of the two groups were mostly grade 1 to 2, and could be tolerated. The incidence of bone marrow suppression in observation group was higher than that in the control group (P<0.05), and the remaining adverse reactions were not statistically different from control group. Cox regression analysis showed that performance status (PS) (P=0.020) and age (P=0.049) were independent prognostic factors for the effect of docetaxel combined with PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor.@*CONCLUSIONS@#The second-line treatment with docetaxel plus PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor in patients with stage IV NSCLC can improve the DCR and prolong the PFS, and the adverse reactions are tolerable.
ABSTRACT
@# Objective: To systematically evaluate the efficacy and safety of PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor combined with chemotherapy as comparing with chemotherapy alone for the first-line treatment of advanced NSCLC (non-small lung cancer). Methods: RCTs (randomized controlled trials) on PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor combined with chemotherapy compared with chemotherapy alone for the first-line treatment of advanced NSCLC were searched in the PubMed, Cochrane Library, EMbase, EBSCO, Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM), Chinese Journal Full-text Database (CNKI), and Chinese Scientific Journal Full-text Database (VIP). RevMan 5.2 software was used for the Meta-analysis. Results: Six RCTs with 3 238 advanced NSCLC patients were included in this study. Meta-analysis showed that the combination therapy group was more effective than the chemotherapy alone group in OS (HR=0.86, 95%CI=0.79~ 0.94, P=0.0006) and PFS (HR=0.81, 95%CI=0.78~0.84, P<0.00001). The incidence of adverse reactions, such as thrombocytopenia of grade 1-5, vomiting, diarrhea, hypothyroidism, hyperthyroidism, rash, pneumonitis, colitis, hepatitis, dysgeusia, hepatitis of grade 3-5 and colitis, in combined treatment group were all higher than those in chemotherapy alone group, the differences were statistically significant (P<0.01 or P<0.05). Conclusions: Compared with chemotherapy alone, PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor combined with chemotherapy can significantly improve the OS and PFS of patients with advanced NSCLC in the first-line treatment, while the overall incidence of adverse reactions is higher than chemotherapy.